


Personal Notes (16) Doing Science

by longhairshortfuse



Series: Carlos's Secret Diary [16]
Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Fluff, Jealousy, M/M, Science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-30
Updated: 2014-05-30
Packaged: 2018-01-27 14:20:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1713737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longhairshortfuse/pseuds/longhairshortfuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Carlos is busy, he is a scientist after all. But he finds time to think about Cecil too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Personal Notes (16) Doing Science

The last couple of weeks have been busy. Cecil announced that the station cat has produced a litter of kittens. Ell wants to take one or two to study, if they can be brought to the lab, although I said I have an allergy so they would have to be kept downstairs. 

He also announced a recruitment drive by some vague, menacing agency, I didn't focus on all the details. I was too busy thinking about how useful it would be to take over the abandoned missile silo where the interviews are scheduled. A silo would be an excellent place to build my time manipulator (Mk2) with a couple of improvements to stability. I wonder if it has a three-phase power supply, or its own generators? A silo would make it easier to rig up a simple but effective self-destruct device without harming anyone outside, it should keep a small detonation contained. 

We had a strange invasion. Hundreds of odd looking, silent children appeared all over town including several in our lab. Gio tried to shoo them out, the lab is no place for children with all that glassware and the chemicals and radiation. But they wouldn't move, just stood there silent and staring into space. They didn't try to touch anything so we managed to work around them for a while but when they did move it was with a single purpose. They picked up Kiran, who was still feeling fragile after recently failing to embark on a more arboreally interconnected lifestyle, and tried to take her out of the lab. Gio tackled the children and pinned three of them down while I helped Kiran free herself. She returned to the relative safety of the pterodactyl cage for the following three days. 

Ell wanted to try to keep one or two of the mute children for study, saying they probably weren't real children anyway, but I persuaded her that this would probably look bad with any sponsor who had any kind of moral fibre or conscience. She didn't reply, just let go of a child's arm and looked at me as if she was going to ask a question but changed her mind.

Cecil explained the source of the problem, in his own way, during his broadcast. Scouts here are unlike the scouts in my home town, although I never joined so I have no valid, first-hand observations. He talked about the Scout Leader, a man called Earl Harlan in a way that made me wonder if they had been close, lovers even, and I briefly hated Harlan for that and wished him not to exist. I understood that I was feeling jealousy. I have never really felt that before, perhaps I have never really loved anyone enough for that until now. 

Cecil reported that Earl was one of the people taken by the children and guilt crept over me.

The Mayor went missing, in the disapparition sense, not the "went out and hasn't come back yet" sense. I would like to ask her how she did that. The physics of transferring every single particle of a person instantly to another location, then reassembling them in exactly the right order, is very complicated. The most I ever achieved was getting a single atom of hydrogen, one proton and one electron, to reappear. It took a lot of painstaking adjustments, ninety seven percent of the time I started with a hydrogen atom and finished with a neutron and an electron-neutrino as somehow the electron and proton landed in precisely the same place. On a macroscopic object there was too much risk of creating a tiny volume of neutronium. An average sized human would reappear as a speck with incredible density. A very, very tiny neutron star.

Cecil gave some dreadfully misleading information about stars and fear of the sky. I wondered if I should call or text him sometime to see if he wants to find out more about astronomy. I mean real facts about what stars are and the relative risk of asteroid impacts. But I know I won't text and I won't call. Just the thought of asking Cecil if he would like to come out to the sand wastes on a clear night, far from the town lights, and see the night sky through my telescope made my heart race. I thought about it, about what might occur if I asked and he said yes. I promised I wouldn't fantasise but the idea of spending time alone with him, just the two of us looking at the stars and planets, moons and if we are lucky, comets, doing science together, was irresistible.

In my new fantasy I called him and he said that would be neat. On a clear night, most nights are clear here, I packed my portable reflector into the back of my car with a couple of head-torches, a blanket and two folding chairs. I picked him up after sunset and drove out to my favourite stargazing spot. He watched and asked questions as I set up the telescope, using Polaris to orient it correctly. He handed me the tools and instruments I needed as asked for them and our hands touched by accident. It was almost pitch dark with just a sliver of moonlight. 

I showed him Jupiter and its four biggest moons. Saturn with fuzzy rings just resolvable if you know what you're looking at. Mars flattening out from a naked-eye point of light to a disc in the telescope image. He peered through the eyepiece on the top of the telescope, head bent over, as I explained what he was looking for. He asked why the objects moved out of the field of view and I explained about our own planet's rotation. I showed him objects that look like stars but when magnified show themselves as nebulas or clusters. I showed him craters on our moon and explained about asteroid impacts. 

He became nervous at this so I took his hand in mine as I explained what a rare event a big asteroid impact is, and how small ones burn up due to friction in our atmosphere. He kept hold of my hand until I said that I had one more thing to show him and set my telescope to find a comet. It's my fantasy and if I want a comet to show Cecil then I'll have one. It would, of course, be spectacular. 

Afterwards, we packed the telescope and lay back on the blanket looking at the sky side by side, unaided once more. Some of the lights move, some do not and some are not the same as I am used to. We picked out constellations of our own and laughed about them. I asked if he was cold and did he want to go home yet. He said yes to the first part of my question and no to the second. I shifted, stroked my hand through his hair and kissed him. He put his arms around me, returned my kiss and pulled me close. 

I woke up the next morning determined to make this fantasy happen. But still I didn't call him.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, I needed some fluff.


End file.
